“If we make some judicious assumptions, it’d be a good guess that the same sponsor is giving the orders to Phoenix Biotech and Edict.”
Gabe didn’t disagree. It made sense. The biotech company would have a board of directors, but this sort of activity required a more direct line of decision making. “Take a close look at the board of directors for Phoenix Biotech. Could be one of them or a connection.”
“In progress.” Marc hesitated then added, “The email about An-mei is pretty concise. Just includes her photograph and bio, some instructions to invite her to the conference and offer her the opportunity to do cutting-edge research for a private organization. There’s not even a mention of Phoenix Biotech. Definitely no information on who picked up the next part of the job. Van Lumanee’s instructions left him in a silo, separate from other players.”
So Porter van Lumanee was a dead end.
“Smart sponsor.” And where did that leave Gabe and his team? “Keep digging, but proceed with caution. It’d be good to figure out if this is potentially a government program or a private interest.”
They really didn’t need to get mixed up in government activity. The US government had a different way of approaching its intellectual resources, more ethical. And a foreign government wouldn’t likely have facilities on US soil where they couldn’t have absolute control. So it wasn’t likely, but it was best to confirm.
“Roger that.” Marc ended the call.
Gabe cursed. They’d turned up information but weren’t any closer to finding their missing person. And even when they did, they weren’t going to be able to do anything about it.
He still had too many questions unanswered, and wearing down the carpet in here wasn’t going to do anyone any good, so he headed back to Maylin. At least he’d gotten things organized in his head so he could address them.
As he rounded the corner of a row of cubicles, he had line of sight on Maylin, still sitting in the conference room and playing with the phone he’d given her. She was backlit, the light from the outside windows a bright contrast to her silhouette. Seeing every elegant line, every curve of her stopped him in his tracks. Damn, the woman took his breath away.
And he was about to tell her there wouldn’t be enough help to get her sister back.
She’d waited long enough. He wasn’t going to dodge giving her the bad news. So he got himself walking again and crossed the last few yards.
Maylin looked up as he approached, her face clearing as she caught sight of him. Hope shone in her eyes and he swallowed hard.
“What are you up to?” Okay, he was going to dodge for a minute. He just couldn’t give it to her cold.
“Hmm?” She looked down at the smartphone in her hands. “Oh! I downloaded a game I play. I hope it’s okay. Caleb got me connected to the guest Wi-Fi.”
Gabe leaned forward and got a look at some cartoon-y dragons and a grid of spheres in multiple colors. “Once we return your phone we’ll reset this one back to factory settings, so it’s not going to matter much. What kind of game is it?”
“My sister got me into playing it.” Maylin gave him a sad smile. “It helps when I get more worried about her than I can handle to jump in and play. It’s mostly a pattern recognition–based game. Match up spheres of the same color, and the corresponding monster in your team does damage to the monsters in the dungeon.”
“Huh.” Okay then. He wasn’t sure what to say. Video games weren’t his thing.
“There’s a simple messaging system in-game too.” She held up the screen to show him. “This was An-mei’s last message to me before she disappeared. This is how I initially knew something was wrong. She wasn’t logging in to play the game, and she logs in every day, multiple times a day. Any time she needs to reset her mind after being too deep in the research. The message freaked me out.”
The message was simple...and weird.
Hey. Miss you. aTaaTaac aTGacTaT aTGaTGcc aTGTaaaa
“What is that?” He’d seen plenty of codes. This one? New to him, and he’d bet Marc would love to take a look at it.
She huffed out a laugh. “It’s a silly thing we started doing after I went through high school biology. You know how kids like to send their notes to each other? This is like leet-speak, but for me and her.”
“But biology-based?” Something familiar about it, but damn, biology class had been a long time ago.
“It’s DNA bases used to indicate binary.” She murmured and pointed to the message. “T and G equal one, and A and C equal zero.”
“Then you take the binary to create a message.” He shook his head. Morse code, he had a chance of reading. Binary? Not his strong point.
“An-mei could read this just by looking at it.” Pride filled Maylin’s words. “I got out of practice after college so I need an online translator for the longer messages. This one, though, it’s short and simple. It’s how I knew she needed me.”